SAVIOR!

The Gap is one of the busiest tourist spots in Sydney Harbor and one of the prettiest. Between two ocean cliffs, it is literally a gap into the Harbor.

It is also a notorious spot. About 50 suicides (and an odd homicide or two) occur there every year, despite the warnings, and the phone help-lines prominently displayed.

But Don Ritchie, 82, has saved over 200 potential suicides in the 45 years he’s been at this task. Some at his urging followed him home for a beer or a meal. Others, tragically, escaped his grasp to leave jackets or hats in his hand as they plunged 150 feet on to the rocks below. Many of the ones he’s managed to save send him letters, champagne, and other such gifts. Their savior! He is the watchman of The Gap. Ritchie was awarded the Medal of the Order of Australia (2006) for his yeoman service to suicide prevention. Savior!

Saving lives is not only for the counselors and others like Ritchie. Christians are integrally to be involved in this enterprise as well, with one difference. It is eternal lives they are after. The good news of the salvation in Jesus Christ is the life-saving message we carry.

In Christ, God was reconciling
the world to himself, not counting
people’s trespasses against them,
he has given us
the message of reconciliation.
2 Corinthians 5:19

God reconciling the world to Himself. Sin would no longer be an issue of separation between God and man, for Jesus Christ, God incarnate, had paid for mankind’s sins.

He made Him who knew no sin
to be sin on our behalf,
so that we might become
the righteousness of God in Him.
2 Corinthians 5:21

No more the threat of eternal separation from God for sin for the believer in Jesus Christ.

For the wages of sin is death
but the free gift of God is eternal life
in Christ Jesus our Lord.
Romans 6:23

And now we are the representatives of the King, heralding this good news.

Therefore, we are
ambassadors for Christ, as though
God were making an appeal through us;
we beg you on behalf of Christ,
be reconciled to God.
2 Corinthians 5:20

Helping save lives. Graciously, prayerfully, lovingly.

… sanctify Christ as Lord in your hearts,
always being ready to make a defense
to everyone who asks you to give
an account for the hope that is in you,
yet with gentleness and reverence.
1 Peter 3:15

Paul’s earnestness in his ambassadorial task ought to be our model. Always seeking to preach Christ, always ready, always depending on God for the strength to do so!

… pray on my behalf,
that utterance may be given to me
in the opening of my mouth,
to make known with boldness
the mystery of the gospel.
Ephesians 6:19

Whether he lived, or died, he wanted to be carrying the message of reconciliation. Saving lives. That was his goal:

… that with all boldness,
Christ will even now, as always,
be exalted in my body,
whether by life or by death.
For to me,
to live is Christ and to die is gain.
Philippians 1:20–21

As Fanny Crosby wrote in 1869:

Rescue the perishing, care for the dying,

Snatch them in pity from sin and the grave;

Weep o’er the erring one, lift up the fallen,

Tell them of Jesus, the mighty to save.

Rescue the perishing, duty demands it;

Strength for thy labor the Lord will provide;

Back to the narrow way patiently win them;

Tell the poor wand’rer a Savior has died.

Save lives!